From a one-way ticket
to LINA LONDON.
Hi, I'm Lina. In 2000 I landed at Heathrow with one suitcase, £80 and a coat that was nowhere near warm enough for my first British winter. I didn't speak much English, didn't know a soul, and spent my first months working early shifts in a laundrette and late shifts cleaning offices — just to cover rent on a room I shared with three strangers.
I made do with cheap things, because that's what you do when every pound counts — the umbrella that flipped inside-out on Oxford Street, the trainers that fell apart in weeks, the jacket that faded after one wash. I promised myself that one day I'd make the things I couldn't afford back then: colourful, well-made, built to last.
Halfway through that journey I lost my brother. It stopped everything. Grief has a way of making your old dreams feel selfish, small, pointless. For a while I let them go. But one morning I picked up that notebook again — and I realised I wasn't just building this for me anymore.
Nobody sees what you carry. Nobody asks. You just keep moving, because stopping doesn't bring anyone back. Today, LINA LONDON is real — and every piece has him in it somewhere.
If you're still holding a dream you've almost talked yourself out of — don't. The world won't stop for your pain. So you may as well make something beautiful out of it.
And to everyone who believed in this idea, shared it, supported it, or simply said "I love that" — thank you. You are part of this colourful journey. More to come. 🖤
Reserve a Piece